


The Five Times Steve Rogers Did the Right Thing (And the One Time He Didn't)

by agetwellcard



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: (kinda but close enough), 5 Times, 5+1 Things, Angst, Canon Compliant, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, i feel weird tagging all of those??, it spans pre-war to post civil war
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-26
Updated: 2016-07-26
Packaged: 2018-07-26 20:29:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7588930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agetwellcard/pseuds/agetwellcard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve's always done the right thing, but he refuses to not choose Bucky.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Five Times Steve Rogers Did the Right Thing (And the One Time He Didn't)

**One.**

Steve tells Bucky to enlist because it’s the right thing to do.

He loves their little life together. Their apartment is the size of a shoebox, and they can barely manage to pay rent on time every month, and the heating routinely shuts off every winter, but it’s their home, and Steve loves that. After Steve’s mother died, he never thought he’d be able to find another place that felt like home.

Steve likes cooking dinner with Bucky, the two of them singing along to the radio loudly and out of tune before settling down at the kitchen table and telling each other about their days as they eat. He likes sitting on the fire escape when it gets too warm during summer and sketching Bucky as he leans into the railing and watches the street below them. He likes going on double dates with Bucky even if all the girls never seem interested in Steve.

They’ve been living their lives together for the past few years so easily and contently that it should really come as no surprise that the world has to come and take it away from Steve.

When war breaks out in foreign countries, Steve follows the news closely, sitting right in front of the radio and carefully reading through the newspapers. There’s a knot of worry in his stomach, and he knows it’s coming. When it does, that doesn’t stop the pain in Steve’s chest.

Bucky comes home from work early the day it happens, heavy look on his face when he settles into the couch next to Steve. The radio is turned down and Steve is biting his lip so that it’s bleeding just as bad as it did a few weeks ago when it was split during a fight.

“Well, shit,” Bucky finally mutters, running a hand through his hair.

Steve doesn’t want to say anything. He wants to go back to how it was before. He wants for them to find a few extra coins in their pockets and head out to Coney Island for the day and eat ice cream on the boardwalk. Worst of all, though, Steve would even go back to being sick in bed for weeks, Bucky watching over him like his mother used to, worried eyes moving over him carefully because even when he was at his worst, he still had Bucky.

He can’t go back, though. He can only go forward to a future he isn’t sure he’s ready to meet.

“Buck,” Steve says, meeting Bucky’s heated gaze. “We have to enlist.”

They both know what Steve is saying. Bucky has to enlist. Steve already knows that it’s likely he’ll be turned away (but damned if he won’t try anyways) but Bucky won’t. Bucky is strong and has always been healthy as ever despite always being surrounded by Steve’s fragile, sick body his entire life. He’ll probably be shipped off to basic the day he enlists.

But Steve tells him to enlist because it’s the right thing to do. It would be too easy for Steve to tell Bucky that he needs him, and that he can’t go fight a war without Steve. Bucky would stay for Steve, too. He’d wait until he’d inevitably get drafted, and even then he might risk it all for Steve. Steve won’t let him do that, though.

Bucky nods solemnly. “I know,” he tells Steve softly, and that’s that.

Steve will think of this moment for years. He’ll think about it when he finds out that there’s apparently a condolence letter (undoubtedly written out to Steve’s address in Brooklyn) with MIA next to Bucky’s name already signed. He’ll think about it when he’s gripping onto the side of a freight train, eyes stinging and chest heaving as he tries to forget the shout Bucky let out as he fell. He’ll think about it when he sees his face clearly for the first time in seventy years, unmistakable eyes staring back at him coldly and unknowing for the first time in Steve’s life before he points his gun right at him.

 

**Two.**

Steve doesn’t tell Bucky he loves him because it’s the right thing to do.

One night, they’re walking home from the dance hall, Bucky’s arm wrapped fondly around Steve’s. Bucky’s drunk, Steve only tipsy, but they walk ungracefully through Brooklyn with bright smiles and loud laughs. Bucky hadn’t found some dame he wanted to walk home for some slim chance he’ll get to kiss her goodnight, so it’s just the two of them.

Bucky’s back on leave for a few days, showing up at the front door with his hands deep in his pockets and a shy smile on his face. They lasted only a few seconds before grabbing at each other, Steve curling into the body that he was scared he’d never be able to hold again.

It’s only fitting that they go out for the night because Bucky loves dancing and Steve loves watching him from the wall.

“I know everybody acts like it’s everything, Stevie,” Bucky mutters drunkenly now, words slurring together, “but maybe I’m not cut out for it.”

“What’re you talking about, Buck?” Steve asks, stifling his laugh.

“Finding a dame, and having kids, and…what _everybody_ does,” Bucky explains, sounding put out.

Steve frowns suddenly. “You don’t want to get married?”

“Not if I got this,” Bucky tells him, pulling Steve closer with a wicked grin as he playfully muses Steve’s hair.

“Cut it out,” Steve whines, shoving at Bucky, but not actually being able to get out of his hold. He’s more than okay with that, though, and maybe even moves so that he’s closer than before.

Bucky snorts. “I’m serious. I wouldn’t need to get married if I could just stay in Brooklyn with you in our shitty apartment.” Bucky suddenly gets serious, a hurt look on his face. He looks Steve deeply in the eyes when he says, “I would be happy with that.”

Steve almost forgets how to walk. He’s grateful that Bucky is leading them even now, arm still wrapped tightly around Steve, like he’s scared that he might somehow get away from him. Steve hates the look on Bucky’s face. He wants to find a way to take it away, turn Bucky into the boy he was before he left, with those gentle eyes and his mischievous smirk.

Most of all, though, Steve wants to tell him he loves him in that moment. He wants to stand in front of him and explain the drowning feeling he’s felt for years when it comes to Bucky and then kiss him so he can know what it’s like even if it’s only for that one time. But his knowing touches and fleeting eyes aren’t his alone, and Steve is almost positive what he feels isn’t unrequited. He’s known for a while, too.

He can’t tell Bucky, though. Bucky doesn’t deserve that life. He shouldn’t have to be stuck with always hiding and always being paranoid. He deserves a beautiful wife and beautiful kids and a life that doesn’t involve taking care of Steve every other month when he gets sick or being ashamed for who he is.

Steve tells himself that it’s not only the right thing to do, but it’s also the easier one too, when he chokes down his embarrassing admission of love, and instead replaces it with, “After the war, Buck, you’ll find the perfect dame and you’ll end up forgetting all about me.”

It’s meant to be teasing, to put a smile on both of their faces when they both don’t want to, but Bucky doesn’t even give him the satisfaction. He only looks down to Steve with his forehead creased and goes, “Maybe.”

 

**Three.**

Steve crashes his plane into the ice because it’s the right thing to do.

His brain is thinking through different ways for this to end, all that don’t end with his death at his own hands. He doesn’t want to think like a survivalist at the moment, though, and he hates how his body is trying so hard to find any way to get out of it. He knows what he has to do, but he doesn’t want to, not really, but now what he has to do and that’s enough.

The ninety-five pound Steve that lived in Brooklyn and went to art classes and sketched on the fire escape might have found a way out of this. Steve now, though, knows how these kinds of things work. He’s been to war, fought on enemy territory with his Howling Commandos. He’s seen his best friend fall and wasn’t even able to go back and look for his body. This is war and Steve will be damned if he tries to be selfish at a moment like this.

Peggy’s voice rings out into his thoughts, though, worry puncturing each word as she tries to get Steve to choose something else. Steve’s already made up his mind. He loves Peggy, but he’s made up his mind. He knows her, too. She’s strong, stronger than he is perhaps, and she’ll be fine when Steve is gone.

Steve resolutely does not think about if Bucky was still alive. He can’t bring himself to wonder if Steve would’ve been more hesitant to go with the self-sacrificing plan if Bucky would’ve still been a factor, if maybe he’d still be able to go back to Brooklyn after the war to their apartment. It doesn’t matter, though. Bucky is dead.

 _Jesus_ , Steve thinks, if heaven is real and Bucky and him both get there, Bucky’s going to give him an earful about this.

He’s looking at her face when the plane goes down, though, and talking to her about their date to go dancing. Steve’s always hated dancing but, in that moment, he wants to dance with Peggy more than anything.

He thinks the worst part is that it doesn’t even really hurt to give up his future with Peggy. He’s lived almost his whole life having to swallow down the truth that he might not get married and have kids and live the life he’s always expected. So, it’s only fitting that he’ll die without ever getting the chance to.

 

**Four.**

Steve doesn’t fight Bucky because it’s the right thing to do.

Standing across from him, Steve finally gets a good luck at Bucky. It had only been quick snippets before, while in front of the barrel of a gun or sidestepping away from a punch to the face. Now, though, Steve stares at his face and part of him hopes that it isn’t really Bucky. It is, though. Steve knows those eyes, and that cleft chin, and those lips. He knows the cut of his jaw and the way he locks it when he looks back at Steve stubbornly.

Steve isn’t sure if he’s relieved or worried to find that it really is Bucky.

Replacing the controller chips is the mission and once it’s finished, it’s just Steve and Bucky. It hasn’t been just Steve and Bucky in so long, that Steve feels weak just thinking of having a life where he doesn’t have to let go of it again. Seeing Bucky look at Steve with those expressionless eyes and with his fists aimed for Steve’s face, it feels like Steve is right back on that freight train, hand reaching out for Bucky, so close but falling short.

“I’m not gonna fight you,” Steve tells him. He won’t. He can’t. When he drops the shield, he doesn’t even feel vulnerable. It feels less like giving up, and more like giving in. “You’re my friend.”

With each punch in the face, Steve wonders if this is how it’s going to end. Steve still remembers when Bucky had curled his fist and showed Steve the proper way to punch someone, smirking fondly when Steve had held up his own fist and stared dumbfounded at it, a new way of life forming with such a simple gesture. He thinks maybe it’s ironic that Bucky might be the one to end that life.

The way Bucky says, “You’re my mission,” sounds like he’s trying to convince himself of it. To Steve, it sounds like the familiar ambiance of Brooklyn right outside his window. To Steve, it sounds like the steady rhythm of Bucky’s breathing next to him in a tent. To Steve, it sounds like hope.

He’ll wonder, later on, if the feeling of Bucky’s finger wrapped around his collar is something he made up.

 

**Five.**

Steve kisses Sharon because it’s the right thing to do.

He tells himself it’s more complicated than that, though.

When Steve first meets her, the day he’s moving in, balancing multiple boxes in his grip, he nearly runs into her. Steve immediately drops his boxes and makes sure the woman isn’t injured.

She blinks a few times at him before she smiles. “Hi, sorry about that,” she says, like it’s her fault Steve ran into her.

“No, it was all me. It’s me who should be sorry,” Steve says before holding his hand out for her to shake. “I’m Steve, by the way.”

She waits for a moment, but then shakes his hand, her grip surprisingly strong. Somehow, Steve thinks that this is a good sign, that her character is somehow ingrained in her handshake. “I’m your neighbor,” she says.

Steve nods. “Hopefully we can get to know each other,” he tells her, already thinking about the second key he was given when he signed the lease. He could probably learn to trust her.

Besides that, he doesn’t think much else of her. Instead, he excuses himself and walks the rests of the boxes into his new apartment.

When he finds out she’s actually SHIELD, he wants to be angry at her or demand to know the exacts of what her job entailed, but he doesn’t ask any of it, though. Instead, he thanks her for her help. It’s the right thing to do, he thinks.

Natasha thinks he should call her. Always brings it up randomly, casually throwing a smirk over her shoulder when she says her name. “You know,” she tells him. “It might do you some good. To get back out there.”

Steve laughs. “I was never out there to begin with.”

He still remembers countless excruciating double dates with Bucky. He was the only reason the girls came, and Steve was stuck awkwardly hanging behind and having to watch every goodnight kiss with his arms crossed over his scrawny chest. None of the girls ever even stuck around long enough for Steve to even attempt a kiss.

With Peggy, though, he wasn’t trying when he found her.

“Even more of a reason to call her,” Natasha says, still smiling at him mischievously.

It’s not even just Natasha who pesters him about Sharon. One day it’s Stark, mostly to make Steve’s dating life the punch line of his joke. The next, its even Sam, who mentions it after Steve gloats about having read a book all day and nothing else.

So, when it comes down to it, Steve can’t think of a reason why he shouldn’t kiss Sharon. Everyone thinks they’d be perfect together, and the public (who would undeniably find out about it, Tony had reminded Steve) would think it was adorable how Steve _did_ end up with a Carter, and Steve could have a shot at leading some sort of normal life one day.

He thinks that maybe (just maybe) he could have a life like Clint. He could get married to her and get an apartment in Brooklyn and Steve could cut back on the amount of missions he takes on. He even imagines them one day having kids, and having a girl and naming her after Peggy. He imagines taking them to Coney Island on the weekends and making breakfast before church on Sundays.

Steve’s not sure if that life is really possible, but he figures he’ll never find out if he doesn’t try.

So, he kisses Sharon and hopes it’s not too late. It must not be because she kisses back, eyes soft and sweet when Steve pulls back. He wonders if maybe she can tell how inexperienced he is, that the list of people he’s kissed is pitiful compared to most. She doesn’t say anything.

From the car, Sam and Bucky are smiling approvingly at him.

Steve stares a beat too long at Bucky, whose smile slips off gently, rounding out into a knowing look. Steve never told him but somehow Steve knows that Bucky knows about his feelings. Bucky doesn’t looked crushed or angry or anything. He’s just staring blankly at Steve now, eyes glossed over.

He wonders if maybe he can also tell that Steve had hoped kissing Sharon would ease the fire in his chest. He wonders if he knows that it did nothing, and that the fire is still raging all in Bucky’s name. He wonders if he knows that Steve still wants him, after all of this time.

Sharon gives Steve a shy smile before getting back in her car, and Steve doesn’t even have to think about the way he smiles back because he’s gotten the trick of a forced smile by now.

 

**\+ One**

Steve chooses Bucky.

Steve doesn’t see the reasons why he shouldn’t, not really. When everyone else, even Natasha, finds reasons for Steve to give up on him, Steve can’t see them. All he knows is that Bucky is _Bucky_ , and that he wouldn’t even know how to give him up even if he wanted to.

With his arm wrapped over Bucky’s shoulders, Steve doesn’t think of what he should be thinking of. He only thinks of how ironic it is that it’s Steve hobbling Bucky out of a fight, grip tight and protective as they head for the jet. It used to be Steve, and Bucky would be the one to guide them back to the apartment and sit him down in the bathroom down the hall to look over his wounds.

When Steve gets him in the jet, he sits Bucky down and kneels next to him, but only stares down with worry at where his arm used to be. Steve’s cleaned up blood, and he’s disinfected wounds, and he’s even sewn up cuts in the particular way his mother had taught him so long ago, but he has no clue what to do with Bucky in this moment.

“I’ve never looked better, huh?” Bucky quips, face still scrunched up in pain.

As much as Steve wants to be angry at him for joking at a moment like this, the words make his shoulders drop in relief. There’s something so familiar about the way he says it, like he can’t help but to tease Steve. Steve suddenly realizes he has Bucky back. He still remembers trying to get drunk in his memory when he thought he died. But he’s here now, and Steve almost can’t comprehend it.

He wants to lean his weight into Bucky, just to feel him there again, but he holds himself back. Only mutters, “Shit, Bucky.”

“I’m okay,” Bucky tells him. He puts his hand on Steve’s forearm and gives him a long look. “We should get out of here.”

Steve nods a few times too many, head still spinning. Bucky’s hand on him is enough to keep him anchored, though. He’s here with him now.

***

In Wakanda, Bucky and Steve are set up in different rooms. It’s barely midnight when Bucky knocks on his door, though, clad in a white tank top and loose sweatpants. His hair is wet and pulled behind his ears, eyes looking at Steve with caution, like he’s not sure if he’s allowed to do this.

Steve steps to the side, to let Bucky in, and they wordlessly fall into bed together, shoulders touching slightly. Something stirs in Steve’s chest with the way that Bucky immediately goes to the left side. That was his side back in their apartment in Brooklyn, when they’d sleep bundled up next to each other on cold nights.

They don’t say anything for a few minutes, and Steve is scared that maybe Bucky went to sleep, but then he pushes closer, so that his chin is up against Steve’s shoulder, dark hair ticklish against his neck. Steve closes his eyes, and for a couple of brief seconds, he thinks he could pretend they’re back in Brooklyn. Before everything that’s happened. He wonders if maybe when he opens his eyes he’ll wake up with bad lungs and Bucky pulling away to go smoke a cigarette on the fire escape with a bright smile thrown over his shoulder to Steve.

When he opens his eyes, he’s only met with darkness, but Bucky is still right beside him, breath hot on his skin.

“Do you thing we’re lucky?” Bucky asks then, voice hoarse and honest.

Steve lets out a weak laugh. “Maybe. Probably,” he hums. “Hard to say. Do you?”

“Would it be fucked up for me to say yes?”

“No.”

After everything that’s happened to them, lucky doesn’t feel like quite the right word. They’ve survived all odds, and maybe that’s what makes them lucky.

Steve isn’t it expecting it when Bucky clears his throat and goes, “I fucking missed you. Even when I didn’t understand what I was feeling, I missed you.”

Steve’s not even sure how to explain how much he missed Bucky. He can’t explain the pain in his chest that didn’t let up for weeks after Bucky fell, or the way he’d talk to Bucky in his head sometimes when he first got out of the ice.

“I missed you too, Buck,” is all he can say.

“Everything is still a little fuzzy,” Bucky tells him quietly, voice sounding particularly unsteady. “But I’m still in love with you. I know that.”

Steve tries to remember how to breathe when he hears this. They’ve never talked about it before, their feelings for each other, but there has always been an unspoken knowledge of it. Hearing Bucky say it out loud, though, makes Steve feel happier than he has in years. He never thought he’d feel this way.

Still, Steve’s heart beats twice its normal rate as he tries to stammer out his reply. “I…me too. Buck, me too.”

In the bright new world they both somehow live in now, it’s no longer the right or wrong thing to love Bucky. It’s just something he feels deep in his bones that makes his heart feel so heavy. Steve thinks maybe they are lucky after all.

Bucky’s hand is warm in his when he entwines their fingers.

 

(It’s not until later that Bucky tells Steve he’s going back into cryofreeze, and Steve knows he can’t stop him. It’s the right thing to do, he tells himself.)

 


End file.
